Ever wanted to blow up your life?

So what do you do with all that turkey . . . ?

We had a great Thanksgiving. I have a lot for which to be grateful. I’m always thankful for my family and friends, here and back home. I’m also thankful for many things in Rome. We’ve met many wonderful people. We are living in a great place with friendly neighbors, elevators big enough to fit the double stroller, and a playground outside the front door. There is much to be thankful for indeed.

I’m thankful we got to share a traditional Thanksgiving meal with friends here. And Thanksgiving meal means leftovers! I don’t get sick of these. Here’s what we did:

Slate recommends a Thanksgiving burrito. We didn’t go that far, but we did start off with plain heated leftovers. Our issue was that we ran out of turkey much earlier than I would have liked. After some calculations, I decided that a 10-15 pound bird would be good. I did tell James that “on the low end of that range should be enough.” Apparently there was some miscommunication, and he came home with a 9.5 pounder. I can only blame myself for lack of clarity. (I mostly blame James.)

So we moved on to other things. Behold, our french toast casserole sweet potato souffle. For this one, I soaked leftover french bread with milk, eggs, cinnamon, and vanilla overnight (loosely following this, but with way less milk and egg), and baked in the morning with a topping of sweet potato souffle. Our souffle topping is very similar to the one on the french toast so it worked. Oh, did it work. This was a definite winner.

We also did chili mac and cheese. Step one: make chili. Step two: place it over heated macaroni and cheese casserole. And voila!

Even though we were working with a turkey deficit, we did make turkey soup. Kind of followed this recipe. (Many of these recipes are called turkey carcass soup. I know that is exactly what it is, but I wouldn’t mind a little gloss on it.) I browned sausage and then sauteed the veggies in the sausage grease. As the recipe suggests, I added a dollop of leftover mashed potatoes. Now that I’m getting sniffly, this one has been particularly awesome.

What about you? What have you been eating? Any exotic leftover traditions?